Ross Venner

Biography

Boats have been a part of my life since my earliest days. I still remember with affection the toy boats in my bath.

I learned to sail at school, and still remember the smell of new sawn timber from the woodwork shop and the excitement of seeing flat sheets of plywood bend to become something almost animated, a boat.

Smashwords Interview

Your first books are about boats and sailing - are these very important to you?

I've knocked around boats and harbours all my life. Yes, these things are important to me. It's among sailing folk, yachties and professionals I've found much of my life that has shaped me.

Well, if boats are important to you, what was your first boat?

She was a 10ft clinker lugsail dinghy built by Hampers of Fareham. We called her Sparrow - Brown small and lots more like her. Sadly sparrow are far less common in England today.

Books

With the China and the USA bickering with each other and North Korea trying to exploit the conflict, the situation is becoming more precarious by the day. Retired Sydney accountant Warren Blake takes his wife and son on a cruise in the Pacific on his old gaff cutter yacht - Seakeeper.
Voyage with the family through the newly precarious world and changed political realities at home and abroad.

Her modelling career was fading and Caroline knew it. She's already made it clear to George, her agent that she will not do topless shoots or anything of that sort and her choices are becoming limited. In fact she needs a proper job.

Smashwords book reviews by Ross Venner

Anodibe Whatkins
on July 27, 2017
Warren Emens novella is a closely drawn view of a troubled life, yet it manages to offer, at its conclusion, a tantalizing hint of salvation.

Rapide
on Sep. 16, 2017
Rapide (de havilland DH 89 - Rapide) encapsulates the twilight of the wood and fabric airliners which briefly pioneered the air routes of the world before their replacement by "modern" all metal aeroplanes.
B J Miller's plot, particularly the journey to Australia, is wholly credible. By 1939, aircraft were largely reliable and adventure more likely to be had on the ground than in the air. That said, even today such a trip in a short ranged aircraft would be challenging. The aviation details are well drawn and suggest that the author is familiar with aviation of the period.
A thoroughly enjoyable read.

Exciting Isn't It?
on Dec. 17, 2018
Exciting, isn't it - Yes absolutely, well titled. O'Neill sends his principle characters, John Murray and Gabrielle on a hair raising series of adventures across Europe and the USA as the necessity of their own survival pits them against cynical international conspiritors and money launderers.
Written in 2012, "Exciting isn't It" nonetheless encapsulates the loss of trust that is so pervasive within the community 6 years later.
Definitely 5 stars.

Home Front
on Dec. 17, 2018
The human aftermath of war. Warren Emens creates a sureal, perhaps "sun dappled" vision in a claustrophobic rural setting.
The emotions an conflicts are intensely captured as the layers of deception are peeled away.